Introduction

Have you ever thought about the fact that by improving your breathing, you improve the function of every cell in your body?

So whether it's your eyes, your balance, your musculoskeletal system, your lungs, your skin, your hair or your brain: every cell is improved in its respective function.

Respiration and nervous system

Breathing is also the only function of the human body that can switch back and forth between voluntary control, i.e. conscious control, and involuntary control, i.e. unconscious regulation. For example, you cannot voluntarily control the involuntary or autonomic processes of the body. You cannot decide to produce more stomach acid or bile now. But you can voluntarily or arbitrarily decide to stretch out your hand to grab a glass of water.

When breathing, you can switch between the two functions: You can consciously and deliberately hold your breath or breathe in or out slowly and for a long time, but you cannot hold your breath until you suffocate. Instead, your brain will always switch back to automatic mode.

As a result, breathing has the extreme potential to influence both the voluntary and the voluntary nervous system and to bridge the gap between the two areas.

Influence of breathing on your training performance

Breathing is important. It is essential for survival. Breathing supplies our body with oxygen. The gas exchange of oxygen and carbon dioxide is also known as external respiration. During internal respiration, metabolic processes initiate the production of energy in the cells. The inhaled oxygen is consumed and broken down. This produces carbon dioxide. It is important that oxygen and carbon dioxide are present in a balanced ratio.

Your breathing influences the following factors:

• Optimization of the blood gas profile
• Positive change in hormone production and functioning of many cells
• Lowering the stress level
• Increase in performance
• Increasing coordination skills
• Less tension in the neck and shoulder area
• Increased mobility and biomechanical optimization of the torso and chest
• Optimized oxygen supply in the cells

What you should generally look out for:

1. Breathe in and out evenly. 
2. Breathe in through your nose and out through your nose. 
3. Try to make the exercises so intense that you can still control your breathing. 
4. Focus on the exhalation and try to breathe out all the air.

Breathing as the basis

Breathing is the basis for health, well-being and performance. Improving your oxygen supply and conscious, mindful breathing increase your mental and physical performance. This makes your body more resilient and allows you to take your training to the next level. This can result in longer workouts or more intensive training sessions.

Exercise example - ladder breathing

The following exercise will help you to become more aware of your breathing.

Purpose of the exercise and to be observed:

This exercise improves your breathing and has a positive effect on your posture at the same time. By targeting the different breathing zones, your body learns to breathe more intuitively again. This leads to more relaxation and balance.

• Make sure your spine is straight during the exercise.
• Breathe in and out through your nose.
• Breathe calmly and evenly.

Implementation:

• Place your hands on your stomach and take 5 even breaths through your nose into your stomach.
• Compare the right and left sides.
• Then place your hands on the costal arches and take 5 even breaths through your nose into the costal arches.
• Wrap your hands around the ribcage so that the thumb on the back and the fingers on the front touch the ribs.
• Compare the right and left sides.
• Then place your hands on your chest and take 5 even breaths through your nose into your chest.
• You can place your thumb under the axilla so that you can better enclose the chest.
• Compare the right and left sides.

Tip:

• You can also incorporate the exercise into your everyday positions as a progression. Always pay attention to the area in which you breathe dominantly and keep trying to target all three areas individually and then in combination.
• The exercise can also be combined with flexion and extension, rotation or lateral tilt of the spine.

How much breathing is in AIMO?

We have included various breathing exercises in the AIMO fit app. In general, you can pay attention to the points mentioned above for each exercise.
If you want to do an exercise more intensively, you can try exhaling and then holding your breath and doing a few repetitions while holding your breath. Then breathe in and out evenly through your nose again.

So what are you waiting for?

Start with your daily movement impulse to get the most out of your well-being and performance in just 2 minutes.